This book chapter explores student learning and growth after participating in the Science, Society, and Service-Learning in Rwanda study abroad program. The students participated in what the authors define as deep service-learning, one experience that took place over a few days, allowing for more meaningful engagement, and shallow service-learning, two separate experiences that each occurred over a few hours, allowing for less interaction. The authors used Likert-scale and open-ended post-trip questions to assess the students in three categories: 1) global competency and cultural awareness, 2) personal growth and development, and 3) communication and teamwork. The students rated the first category the highest. The authors also assess the effectiveness of the service-learning experiences by including the perspectives of the Rwandan community partners.
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Service-learning is considered in higher education as a high impact practice that blends classroom learning with community engagement in an attempt to bolster student learning of course content as well as various skills and dispositions such as citizenship, perspective taking, and intercultural awareness (Kuh, 2008; Meyers, 2009; Welch & Plaxton-Moore, 2019). Faculty and students can participate in a variety of service-learning activities including direct service, indirect service, advocacy, and research (Welch & Plaxton-Moore, 2019). Morton (1995) asserts that service-learning includes three paradigms on a continuum from charity to project to social change or advocacy. These paradigms can be “thin” or “thick” depending on the lens through which faculty and students engage with the community and the type of service conducted. Charity work risks being thin service-learning that has the potential to reinforce established structures of power and privilege, exactly opposite the intended outcomes of service-learning (Bowen, 2014, Mitchell, 2008; Morton, 1995). Another way of describing the range of student experiences within Morton’s paradigms is that the service-learning falls on a continuum from shallow to deep, characterized primarily by whether and to what extent students and faculty invest in relationships with community partners and the level of concern shown to the root causes of a problem (Corso, 2008).
Within current service-learning scholarship, many authors are advocating for a shift from traditional service-learning to critical service-learning (Bowen, 2014; Latta et al., 2018; Mitchell, 2008). Critical service-learning intentionally approaches community engagement through a social justice lens focused on systemic injustice and inequality. Critical service-learning, when crafted carefully, has the potential to interrupt age-old hierarchies and power structures, providing for truly transformative student experiences. McEachen (2017) advocates for deep learning based on a foundation of character, citizenship, collaboration, communication, creativity, and critical thinking. The deep learning paradigm can be utilized in the design and implementation of critical service-learning.
However, whether students engage in traditional or critical service-learning, the experience remains thin or shallow without a reflective component built in to the service (Harrell, 2022; Welch, 2019). Kolb’s (1984) experiential learning cycle is commonly used as a model for understanding the power and importance of student reflection following any form of experiential learning, including service-learning (Cone & Harris, 1996; Latta et al., 2018; Salam et al., 2019). Reflection provides the opportunity for students to make meaning from their experiences, to investigate important questions, and to conceptualize future interactions. Student reflection is necessary to move service-learning experiences from shallow to deep.